Samsung sales of the Galaxy S II top 20 million units in just 10 months

Samsung’s just issued a press release announcing that they’ve sold over 20 million Galaxy S II smartphones since launching the device in April. The things is, while the Galaxy S II did actually go on sale in April, it was on the 29th and in just one country: South Korea. In May the GSII hit Europe, then it eventually hit the other side of the pond in September. Well, at least on Sprint. T-Mobile users had to wait until October. AT&T users had to wait until November. Verizon never even got the Galaxy S II, though to be fair they did get the Galaxy Nexus. Anyway, May 2011 to February 2012 = just 10 months, so basically 2 million handsets per month. That’s an astonishing number. To put that into some perspective, the original Samsung Galaxy S just recently exceeded 22 million units sold, and that device launched way back in June 2010. Then there’s the iPhone. Apple sold 93 million of them in 2011, which is 7.75 million per month. In other words, for every Galaxy S II that Samsung sold, Apple sold nearly 4 iPhones.

But enough about that, let’s talk about the elephant in the room: the Samsung Galaxy S III. Many of us were hoping to see it being announced at Mobile World Congress next week, but the company issued a statement saying that they’re going to host their own event later this year instead of rubbing elbows with the 60,000 sweaty men that are going to be flooding Barcelona. Now before you get disappointed, let us remind you once again, the Galaxy S II hit Europe in May of last year, yet it was announced three months earlier at MWC 2011. Samsung just wants to limit the time between unveiling their new device and brining it out to market, just like Apple does whenever they announce something new and then say it’s shipping next week.

We actually applaud them for that. Much of what’s going to be announced on Sunday and Monday isn’t going to come with a launch date or a price tag, and that’s infuriating.